Perez Leads BYU in Win Over Ohio State

LONG BEACH -- Behind a strong overall performance by Ivan Perez, BYU defeated Ohio State 3-1 (27-30, 30-24, 30-21, 32-30) in the first match of the Long Beach State Active Ankle Classic Friday night at the Pyramid. With the win, the Cougars are 15-4 overall and 12-4 in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation while the Buckeyes are 15-5 overall and 3-2 in the MIVA.

Perez led BYU with match highs of 18 kills and 10 digs while adding a team-high five blocks. He also hit .375 for the match. Rodrigo Gomes was second on the team with a career-high 13 kills and Victor Batista and Russell Holmes added 10 kills apiece. Taylor Evans, filling in for an injured Brian Rowley at libero, tied Perez for the match lead in digs with 10.

The Cougars won despite being out-hit .300 (55-19-120) to .266 (66-32-128). BYU did win the defensive battle, recording 39 digs to 23 for Ohio State.

The Buckeyes had three players with double-digit kill totals, including John Albertson (13), Stuart Katz (11) and Layne Dreven (10). Albertson also added eight blocks while Robbie Klein had three aces.

BYU lost the first game 30-27 while being out-hit .471 to .200. The Cougars took the lead at 1-0 on a kill by Jonathan Charette but the quickly fell behind 4-1 and trailed by as many as five before fighting back to lead at 22-21. The Buckeyes got back in control, though, scoring the next three points, two on BYU errors, and leading the rest of the way, securing the win on a Klein kill.

The Cougars bounced back in game two, winning 30-24 while hitting .296 compared to .240 for Ohio State. BYU built a big lead early at 9-3 with three Cougar points coming on kills and the rest on Buckeye errors. BYU coasted from there, leading by at least five the rest of the way.

Ohio State was in control early in game three, scoring the first four points before the Cougars clawed back to tie the game at seven. With the score knotted at nine apiece, BYU scored five of the next seven points to go up by three and controlled the game the rest of the way, gradually increasing the lead and going on to win 30-21. The Cougars hit .333 while the Buckeyes hit just .120.

Game four was a back and forth battle with Ohio State taking a big lead at 16-9 only to see it slip away. The Cougars went on a 11-5 run to get within one at 21-20 but let the Buckeyes get back up by three on a kill by Dreven and a Charette hitting error. BYU again came back, tying the score at 24 on a kill by Batista. The score was tied six more times, the last at 30. Then Perez recorded a kill to give the Cougars their third match-point opportunity and Gomes finished things off with an ace, his second of the night.

BYU will play against Rutgers-Newark in its second and final match of the Active Ankle Classic, Saturday at 5:30 p.m. in the Pyramid.